Olympic Notes: Slam Dunk On The Earthquake

It was just a brilliant piece of propaganda in the Olympic opening ceremonies, pairing Chinese NBA basketball star Yao Ming and nine-year-old Lin Hao as flag bearers for the Chinese team.  Hao has been hailed for rescuing classmates during the catastrophic earthquake in Sichuan province.

I juxtapose the shots I snapped off the tube — the little boy paired with Ming, and toting the Chinese and Olympic flags (to the gushing of the network anchors, as you can just imagine) — with this incredible shot featured recently by the NYT illustrating how the Chinese government has been using money and pressure to buy the silence of parent who suffered the loss of their children in these poorly-constructed collapsed schools.

(And yes, BAGnewsNotes is blocked in China.)

China Presses Hush Money on Grieving Parents (NYT)

(image 1-3 NBC. image 4: Shiho Fukada for The New York Times. caption: Yu Tingyun, left, lost his daughter, Yang, in the May earthquake in southwest China, and Huang Lianfen, right, lost a nephew. Ms. Huang holds an agreement that Chinese officials want parents to sign, saying they will not hold protests about collapsed schools.)